What did I do to deserve you?
by Avarwen
Summary: And for that I owe you more than my life and loyalty. I owe you my mind, body and soul. My heart you already have. OneShot fic!


A\N: Okay peoples, this is another one my fics set in the same sort of mind as "Understand" and "Forever can't Last". Not nearly as deep as "Forever can't last" but still suitable enough I think.

Anyway, I've discovered I enjoy writing these sorts of stories, but so far I've only done Inuyasha and Kagome. I'm thinking of broadening my horizons, so maybe sometime in the near future I will write a Sango or Miroku fic like this. If you like those characters then keep your eyes pealed for them!

Also, I have been answering reviews to my one-shot fics and they are posted on my profile page (since seems to not want us to make A\N as chapters) so if you reviewed one of them, there is probably a reply there, though I haven't gotten around to updating it in the past couple of days.

**VERY IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER:** I do not own nor do I make any money off of Inuyasha or any of the other characters associated with the anime. I thought I did once, but the pills are definitely helping... The story, however, is mine. If you understand this, then please continue reading.

What did I do to deserve you?

Kagome, what did I do to deserve you? How am I managing to keep you here at my side?

Sure as hell can't be my personality. You've told me yourself on a myriad of occasions that I'm a stupid, obnoxious jerk.

So why the hell are you still with me?

It can't be because I protect you-- Miroku and Sango and Kirara, hell, even _Shippo_ can protect you if you need it, or you can always go home when there is serious danger. Not that you were ever one to flee from serious danger, but that's hardly the point. The point is that, if the need arises, you can always go home. And you do.

Whenever you're mad at me you go there because you know my pride is too big for me to swallow and let me come and get you.

Sometimes you just go to take those damn tests of yours. In my opinion, you take far too many of the stupid things. How can your future in that era depend on whatever you scribble down on a piece of paper? Here it's determined by much more important things-- like how and if you can wield a sword. But you insist these things are damn near matters of life or death and you run off to take them, leaving us stranded back here with nothing to do for days on end.

But you always come back.

And that makes me secretly question the amount of sanity or, at least, commonsense you truly possess.

If I were you I probably would have left me a long time ago. Although, if I were you I would have given up on that damn skool thing a long time ago as well, not to mention coming back here to kick Kouga's ass into the deepest circle of hell for ever laying eyes on me.

You'd never do that.

You've either got the tolerance and patience of a saint, or you enjoy his attention and\or don't want to hurt him by telling him he's not wanted. I guess nobody every informed that fucking flea-bag that the truth hurts. A lot.

I know it ain't the first option, cause you've chewed me up and spit me out more times than I can remember.

I suppose I'm asking for it a lot of the time, though.

Then again, Shippo is usually asking for it when he starts whining and nagging me about one thing or another. But whenever I go to teach that runt a well deserved and desperately needed lesson, you come along and stop me. And you're wrong for doing that. I know you love Shippo and want to protect him, but he's a demon-- a _child_ at that-- not a human baby, and by now, if his parents were still alive, he'd already be fighting and battling hard against other demons and out hunting for his own food. But you don't understand the ways of demons I guess, and so, whenever I go after him, you take his side and "sit" me hard enough to break ground.

I sometimes wonder that, if you ever got angry enough to sit me as hard as you possibly could, if I'd just plough right through the thick blanket of earth and go right down into the very depths of hell.

I think you could do it, if you really wanted to. I'm glad you don't want to.

And to think, Kikyo's been trying for ages to send me to hell using so many bizarre and complex methods, and all you'd need is one well placed and truly enraged "sit".

Kikyo.

How do you really feel about her, anyway?

How do _I_ really feel about her?

I don't love her anymore, I'm certain of that, but I can't forget her either. She was my first love, after all, and she gave her life to be with me when she thought I was dead. She was the first one to ever try and understand me-- see me for who I am not what I am-- and that means a great deal to me.

But she didn't.

She never managed to understand me, and in the end she wanted me to change my very being so that I could be what she thought would make us happy. And I would have done it. But not for me. I would have become human if only to make her happy. But I have been human before-- once every month-- and I know how vulnerable they are. To go from a half-demon hated by all with many who'd love to see me dead to a human who may or may not be accepted by other humans and would be easy prey for any demon who wished to kill me still... it was not an entirely appealing thought to me. And Kikyo never understood that, or really anything else about me. Not then, not now, not ever.

I barely understand myself.

But you Kagome, _you_ understand me, if only a little-- that's a little more than anyone else. You see both who I am and what I am and you don't ask me to change either. In fact, you ask me-- sometimes _beg_ me-- to remain the same. And that means even more to me.

_You_ mean even more to me-- than Kikyo or anyone else for that matter. I don't think even my own mother ever meant as much.

It's a damn scary thought to think you're so important to me. You're like a splinter of wood, unwanted and painfully annoying at first, but slowly, as you festered and drove yourself deeper inside of me, I had no choice but to change to accept you and let you become part of me. And occasionally irritating and\or painful part of me, but a part of me nonetheless.

And I don't know how you came to mean so much to me, but you do. Gods do you ever, Kagome, and it kills me to think of anything ever hurting you.

Especially me.

When I become demon (and I don't mean with the jewel) I loose myself. In order to save myself and my life I have to destroy my soul. And I don't want that. I never wanted _that_. It's the one thing in the world that terrifies me to no end.

When I murdered those bandits you and that boy said that I was trying to save the innocent. You were wrong. I couldn't tell the difference.

I was just killing whoever seemed the strongest-- I would have gone after Miroku or Sango or maybe even _you_ because to me you were wall the same-- just prey to feed my demon's bloodlust. I only went after the bandits first because they were trying to run, and I _know_ that my demon did not want _any_ of you to get away. It wanted to murder you all.

Then Sesshomaru came, and he was demon and the strongest opponent present, and I _craved_ his blood like I have craved nothing else ever before. I was nearly desperate with the desire to kill him. And _that,_ if nothing else, I remember.

And it scares me, Kagome.

Every time I transform I loose part of myself. Every time I transform I come closer to killing you.

But that also gives me strength.

It gives my soul a reason to fight for dominance when I transform.

And sometimes, like when I battled Ryukotsusei, that's enough to give me enough control over my body to grab Tetsusaiga and transform back.

And for that I owe you more than my life and loyalty. I owe you my mind, body and soul.

My heart you already have.

But do I have yours? Would you even attempt giving it to me in return? I am, after all, just a half-demon-- and by definition that makes me prey to any and all who wish to kill me-- demon and human alike-- weak, filthy, and unworthy of existence, much less love.

Yet I see the looks you sneak at me sometimes.

At first I didn't recognise what I was seeing in them, but they always made me feel incredibly young for reasons I didn't understand.

For a long time I pretended not to notice them as I silently wondered why those looks of yours would have such an effect on me. And then it hit me-- harder then the ground that rushes up to smack me in the head every time you "sit" me.

The reason why I always feel so incredibly young when you look at me like that is because the last person to ever look at me like that was my mother, when I was still a very young child by human standards.

Even Kikyo never looked at me like that.

Her eyes always held compassion, but the pity she felt for me and the remorse of all she would have to give up to be with me always overrode any signs of love I ever saw in her eyes.

You don't pity me.

You show sympathy for the things I have been through-- things you don't even know about-- but you never pity me.

You just look at me with those eyes, soft and calm and fierce all at once, full of love but uncertainty as well-- as though you don't truly believe this is happening, or that you and I _can_ happen, and I want to make you believe, but I'm just as unsure myself.

I feel that gaze of yours land on my, and this time I look up and meet it, and our eyes lock for several eternity's contained in a few mere seconds before you smile gently, a light tinge of pink tinting your cheeks, and look away.

The sound of flesh connecting violently reaches our ears and alerts us to another of Miroku's attempted molestations of Sango's ass, and you sigh as the moment is further broken and we are again shoved back into the harshness of reality.

You talk to Shippo-- whose again whining on about one stupid thing or another-- and I grumble and call you "wench" like I always do as we fall back into our unwitting routine. Your eyes narrow and you "sit" me again.

I complain loudly and shout at you, but there's not fire behind my words, just as there was none behind your "sit". I barely even _dented_ the fucking ground!

Miroku makes some comment that zooms by my uninterested mind as I pull myself up from the dirt, watching carefully after you as you continue walking until... there it is!

You glance back over your shoulder and give me another of your looks-- the looks you share only with me-- and I offer you a small nod and one of my own, trying to convey all I feel into a simply glance, because really that's all I have.

My body belongs to me for now, as does my soul, but when my demon takes over, it is no longer my own.

My life belongs to Kikyo-- or Sesshomaru I suppose, whichever one of them comes first, because, lets face it, eventually one of them is _bound_ to take it from me.

I can't even offer you my love.

For one, it would make it-- already has-- too easy for someone like Naraku to use against us and manipulate us.

For another, I can be sure I can trust myself to love you.

I want you, but I don't trust myself not to hurt you. And anyway, my love would only get you shunned.

But you don't care about that. You never have, or else you would not be here still-- you would not have stayed. And you shouldn't have, if any of what I'm thinking is true (which it is). And yet here you are.

You stay by me still, though I've nothing to give, and so, even now, I have to ask myself: What did I do to deserve you?

END


End file.
